Hard work is close to paying off for NORC

By STEVEN F. HUSZAI Staff WriterPublished: April 7, 2014 4:00AM

WOOSTER -- Kevin Burwell, jokingly dubbed "the dork from NORC," visited members of the Wooster Growth Corp. for their Thursday meeting.

The Northeast Ohio Regional Center, or NORC, was established by Wooster Growth and the Wayne Economic Development Council as another tool in the economic development tool box for investment opportunities in the area.

In this case, NORC has been designated as an EB-5 center for Wayne and the other 15 counties under Team NEO's umbrella.

The EB-5 program is operated by the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services. It offers green cards to immigrants who invest at least $1 million in a U.S. commercial project, and create at least 10 jobs. Only 1 percent of all visas granted in the U.S. are through EB-5, Burwell said.

Burwell was appointed in 2012 to head NORC, and reported the years of work is close to paying off.

He said several promising projects, such as the Le Meridian hotel in Cleveland and another in Moraine (a Dayton suburb), among others are possible revenue generators for NORC.

Margo Broehl, president of Wooster Growth, said NORC has "been a long haul" due to the economy in establishing the regional center, but the work put in years ago is close to paying off.

The NORC was created to bring investment to Wooster and Wayne County in areas such as the BiOhio Research Park.

"Our goal was to develop a mechanism in Wayne County to help fund projects here," Broehl said, although those projects have not been large enough to-date. Projects where EB-5 investment can be used need to be at least $5 million, Burwell noted.

But Broehl added once the applications are processed, NORC will receive a fee from each investor. "So we're lucky to have this done and get our tracks on the ground."

Broehl said other EB-5 regional centers were established as for-profit entities, whereas NORC is a not-for-profit one that would generate a flat fee for accepted investors.

"We want to be transparent, we want to be fair and our goal truly is for economic development," Broehl said. "It's exciting to believe we're going to have cash flow."

Jonathan Millea, the city's development coordinator, told Wooster Growth members the Long Road property went out for a request for proposal and received two written offers.

He anticipated some more projects under the Community Reinvestment Area program to come in within the next few weeks.

Reporter Steve Huszai can be reached at 330-287-1645 or shuszai@the-daily-record.com. He is @GeneralSmithie on Twitter.